On 01/03/2011 13:21, Baz wrote:


What tips have you for 'making do' with tools?
Baz



My most useful homemade tool is my finger dibber. I've never ever seen
one in the garden centres but now I mention it here it will probably
only be a matter of time!

I use it to plant onion sets and set out other seedlings. It is approx
one and half inches long and made from a piece of metal tube that is
slightly larger in diameter than my index finger. I've flattened one end
and bent the sides over into a flat spear shaped point. To make it
comfortable to wear I cut off the index finger off an old pair of gloves
and fixed it inside with some exoxy-resin glue.

The finger-dibber is perfect for use in soft ground. The advantage of
this over a conventional dibber is that when planting lots of seedlings
or onion sets that I don't need to keep putting it down and picking it
up again between setting each plant.

The advantage of using the finger-dibber over no dibber at all i.e. just
poking a hole with your finger is that you don't force soil up under
your finger nail which sometimes goes just that bit too far up and can
cause infection.

The other homemade tool I use a lot is simply a small garden hoe to
which I've attached a long brush stave handle. It is great for getting
into tight spots to do weeding without bending my back and for weeding
between onions and other plants that are too close together for a
conventional full size hoe.


--
David in Normandy.
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